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I have been told to never wear one again!

I’m old and have the body to match. Hubby & I have been married for 42 years and I don’t think he’s gonna leave me for a younger woman. But I gotta say, I hate women at the pool basically naked. Why? You don’t want tan lines? How the hell do you dress in your everyday life that someone would see tan lines?!?!! Ditto for men, leave the Speedo home. Your junk is not that attractive! Signed - a crabby old lady!’

I never thought I would say this, but the desire is not there for me with this class. One, it is way too large, I can't imagine feeling comfortable with close to 10k people. Two, it is much too family focused, I don't have children and I try to avoid sailing with too many. With even more non-suite cabins focused on families and neighborhoods dedicated to children and families; it doesn't sound like I would be able to find good places to chill and relax. Lastly, it will be too expensive for a very long time. I don't care about slides, games etc. so I can't imagine paying a premium for that. However, I am glad for the cruisers with children to be able to have more options.

Yep. On the Oasis....Icon Celebration Party on the Promenade last night at 11pm. Ballon drop and prizes, including a freebie sailing on Icon!

And who gets to define having "the body to pull it off"???

Probably getting ready for another “sale” so they are jacking the prices up in order to look like the “sale” prices are great! Happens a lot lately!

I'm not sure that one's preferred choice of swimwear equates to respecting or failing to respect other passengers. Everyone should wear what they want within the ruleset provided by Royal Caribbean. Those who don't love the choices of others shouldn't see that choice as a sign of disrespect. They might not like your clothing either.

As long as you know what you are potentially getting yourself into, the inaugural sailing is a lot of fun. There's lots of media and it attracts a lot of the cruise ship vloggers so you'll see a lot of folks walking around talking to cameras It can be pretty entertaining and it's a lot of fun to experience it yourself first hand before catching it on someone's vlog. Plus they usually give everyone some cool swag for being on the inaugural sailing. But there's always the chance that things aren't completely finished. This happened a lot with Wonder, but there were really so many factors that played into that from the pandemic to supply chain issues and staffing, etc., that touched many aspects of the ships (shows, venues, activities, etc.) There's quite a bit more of a runway to the first official sailing for Icon so one would hope they will have it more together by the time the sailing happens, but you never know!

We knocked on the DL door in July and the guest who opened the door actually asked to see our set sail passes, lol. I guess he deputized himself as the DL police.

Do be careful though. I have known someone who got their passport stamped by some unofficial touristy thing in Mexico and the US government was not thrilled when they saw it in his passport coming back in to the US. Gave him a "warning" for lack of any official term.

The Diwali sale this Monday should carry us through to the Halloween Spooktacular Savings, which will hold our interest until the Veterans Day Honoring our Heroes with Savings Sale which will end shortly before Black Friday. No worries.

Cruise Director on Allure just said the Icon party on the Promenade from 11pm-12:30am is giving away swag including a free room on the inaugural sailing….

I’m currently on Adventure and a friend on Oasis is reporting the same. Royal will be raffling a cruise for 2 for Icon on each of its ships tonight during the “Icon welcome party” tonight. It’s ironic that the party is listed in the cruise compass but not in the app!

And to top it off. I got the e-mail on my phone about an hour ago that says *Congrats!* You've been ch... It's just an ad for the HUGE SALE that is "Ending Soon", and I need to "Act Fast", but has been going on for months and months now.

If you have the body to pull it off, then go for it. If you don't have the body to pull it off, then for the sake of the rest of us, please don't do it!

Not all places will do this for cruise visitors. I asked while we were in Curaçao and couldn't find anyone that knew of a place to get a stamp. There were a few places we inquired in the past, like Cartegena, that did not have a place that was available since they clear the whole ship in one process. There are others that were quite accommodating. While transiting the canal, a Panamanian immigration officer came onboard and was available at guest services to provide passport stamps. It also gives you another reason to have your passport with you when you leave the ship while in port.

They've said there's no plans to charge for any of the onboard pools / waterslides.

Full city roast: It's a medium roast. Coffee beans are like popcorn, with some water trapped inside that makes them expand, only they "pop" twice. Full city is after all of the beans have "popped" the first time, and are about to start the second "pop" (called a "crack" in coffee roasting lingo). Second crack gets into dark and espresso roasts, and the flavor of the beans becomes overpowered by the flavor of the roast. I'm not disrespected by anything anyone drinks. My coffee taste evolved over time, in tiny steps. Well, buying a home coffee roaster was kind of a bigger step. But over decades of drinking coffee with breakfast, I've found my favorite kind of beans, my favorite roast, my favorite brew method, etc., and it's not too time consuming or expensive. About twenty five cents per cup (green beans are cheaper than roasted beans), and about thirty minutes of time each week monitoring the roast, which I can do while I read a book). Coffee beans are the seed or pit of a fruit, called a coffee cherry. The cherry flesh has to be removed from the bean. Most coffee is made with a "wet process", where the cherry is soaked in water, then crushed between rollers to split the cherry from the bean. Ethiopian coffee uses the dry process. They spread the cherries on a rack and leave them in the sun to dry. While drying, the juices of the cherry soak into the bean, giving it tart flavors like lemon, cherry, strawberry and blueberry. They aren't overpowering or artificial, just hints on top of the base coffee notes. It was a revelation the first time I experienced a medium roast, natural process Ethiopian coffee. Sir Richard Francis Burton, the legendary 19th century British explorer, wrote about the wonders of coffee from Harrar in Ethiopia. It's where coffee was first domesticated, so they know what they're doing. Thanks for coming to my TED talk.

Yes. My take-away from the other posts is that one should remember it is a family cruise line with lots of older guests, but fashionable attire is fine. PS. My wife won't let me wear a speedo, either!

Will be closely tied to Lelepa but the looks of it https://cruisepassenger.com.au/news/exclusive-royal-carribbean-expects-to-homeport-in-brisbane-year-round/?fbclid=IwAR10w_kGFOT-Q1xzcV3KdzaRfImx_dgZXVS5OAqLLriIoBR-r_JDS0pZVCk

@PRMLVM, the thermal suite is so wonderful, at least for me! I have only done it on the Anthem. I buy the full cruise pass (you can purchase by day). It gets you access to the thermal suite any time it is open. You can go to the lockers to drop off your stuff, shower if you like, have the special teas, flavored drinks or hang in the lounge area in the spa. In the thermal suite itself, there are maybe a half dozen thermal beds, showers with different settings like rain forest, storm, etc. They have spa music playing lightly. They also have a dry heat room and a sauna. I just chill on the bed, go to the different rooms for a bit, back to the bed, shower. I spend a good chunk of time in there. I find it to be so relaxing! It is one of my absolutely favorite parts of the cruise. Some feel it is a waste of time or money, don’t want to waste time in there with so much else going on or feel pressured to go if they paid for the full length of the cruise. Personally, a cruise is about relaxing and the thermal suite IS one of the things going on, so to speak. If you are not sure, just go to the spa and ask them to show it to you. Once you see it, you may feel one way or the other. I do love it!

DAY 8 - Back to reality We always seem to drag out our last day. We request the latest disembarkation time, and we stretch our morning a bit. We got up, showered and dressed, and crammed the remainder of our things in our carry-on bags, and headed down to the MDR for breakfast by 7:30am. There was a bit of a line but it moved quickly. I got the market breakfast bowl again, and it was delicious again. We said goodbye to our travel family, and headed towards Deck 5 to get off the ship. It was quick and orderly, and before we knew it, we were on the gangway headed back to the terminal. Down the escalator, shuffled through the suites waiting area, and into the luggage warehouse. We found our bags and flagged down a porter for help. We headed to Customs where they have the face recognition cameras. Everyone got the green light, and we followed the porter out to the garage. I grabbed the car, loaded everything up, and we were out in pretty quick time. Because we were so close to New York, we decided to drive north and see the city. We headed towards 81st street to check out some of the playgrounds on the west side of Central Park. We played between two playgrounds, then hopped on the subway to Times Square and hit up one of my favorite places in New York City: After a quick lunch, we hopped back on the subway and headed down to Battery Park so the kiddos could see the Statue of Liberty. We almost hopped on the Staten Island Ferry to get a better view, but after doing the math we realized it would put us home after sunset. We settled for checking out the statue from the water: In the distance, you might be able to see a familiar sight, a farewall call from our home for the week: Next post: thoughts and reflections

Expect that it is horrible in February. It gets so cold here in Florida that during most of February our AC is actually turned off.

I can't comment on the coffee, but if he can only have 1/day you might as well just pay as you go, at least for him.

Not a fan of water activities myself. But I do enjoy watching people having fun at the pools, slides, and other water features.

I went through this a month ago. We purposely obtained official copies of our birth certificates to send so we still had back up birth certificates just in case. Our family of 3 applied back in June for passports. My wife and son got theirs back in 4 weeks. Mine did not and was still showing received and processing. Come to find out one number could not be read on my birth certificate. Prior to finding this out I already already reached out to our state senator Marco Rubio for help. While this was going on I received a letter from the passport processing then telling me this issue. But before I even sent back the letter with correcting the issue, our senator had it taken care of. My passport status changed to shipped and overnighted free of charge. Also got a letter from the senator office thank me for reaching out to help me. Plus I got the new passport where my wife and son got the old. My wife and sons birth certificates were returned about a month ago and mine was returned 2 weeks ago. The birth certificates or documentation will always be after the passport. So if I were you I would reach out to your governor or senator and also apply for another copy of birth certificate in case. VitalChek is the quickest and easiest way to get a copy of birth certificate. Most states refer you to this certified process and company. Where we got our extra ones before we applied for the passports. https://www.vitalchek.com/v/

Have you gone to https://passportstatus.state.gov/ to check the status? If it has been more than 10 weeks and you are not getting help from the state department, you could consider reaching out to your congressional representative. They can submit an urgent inquiry on your behalf to the appropriate U.S. Passport Agency officials, asking them to provide the status of your Passport, and if necessary, to request their assistance in expediting the processing and completion of the Passport.

I just start cruising with Royal this past July. First Cruise - Oasis of the Seas 7-8-22 - Solo 14 points Second Cruise - Adventures of the Seas this coming Sat 10-22-22 - Solo 10 points Third Cruise coming up - Anthem of the Seas 11-22 - Solo 14 points Forth Cruise coming up - Anthem of the Seas 2-23 - Solo 16 points Fifth Cruise coming up - Anthem of the Seas 4-23 - Solo 16 points Sixth Cruise coming up - Ovation of the Seas 5-23 - Solo 16 points That mean I should hit Diamond within one year of the time frame.

I have not been in this situation, however, if I was, I would immediately begin the process of getting a[nother] certified birth certificate. 2 is better than none…and if he does not have either the BC or the passport, he will not be sailing.

They do offer an onboard discount if your are Diamond Plus (30%) or Pinnacle (40%). However, that is onboard prices, so the pre-cruise price would probably still be better. A discount code to use for pre-cruise purchase... now, we are talking. Highly unlikely, though.

I wasn't fully Wowed when the Oasis class ships came out. Only the size was the big wow factor for me. I mean I love going on them with all there is to do, but the Icon class looks amazing and I can't stop watching videos and seeing pictures. Hope I get to sail on her one day!

This is what is called a c-string Bikini and yes I have seen one worn on deck.

Thanks for checking back in with an update; I wish we saw this more often!

A back up for what? They have a perfectly valid passport

There was one at the start of the month (columbus day?), so I guess we should be due another one fairly soon to keep us entertained between now and black Friday.

It’s a women’s hair blow dry bar. They introduced the concept right before covid hit. https://www.royalcaribbeanpresscenter.com/video/1131/blowing-away-expectations-royal-caribbean-opens-first-standalone-blow-dry-bar-at-sea/

I couldn't resist. I just book this cruise also..

Twice as strong as a half city roast?

Missing the second page.

it's going to be one heck of an inaugural sailing, that is for sure!! i personally won't be able to afford it until it's been in service for a bit, probably closer to a year, given how i imagine they will be able to charge a premium for this behemoth of a ship. not gonna stop me from living vicariously through every one else though!!

Yeah mine is Folgers made in a Mr Coffee. Guess you aren’t coming over for a cup.

I've twice had issues during my flight and called 844-278-9745 and always received a prompt and effective response. I hope you have a similar experience.

I am happy to report that we had no issues. Birth certificate accepted without incident. Ty for your responses!

In the Online Planner (RCL Site) you just select the Dining tab. Near the bottom you will see My Time Dinning. Click the option to schedule a dinner and one of the options is to "Add a Guest". Then the form below will pop up to add your friends. you will need their information to add them to your reservation.

LOL. We will never be Pinnacle ever and I am OK with that.

My biggest concern with the avatars in that video is that apparently only skinny people are allowed to sail on icon

It does seem like the neighborhood concept is a way to isolate different types of passengers from one another, and in a good way.

Hi everyone, this is going to be my first cruise. Excited to give it a try.

Once a good shot of Baileys is added, I’ll drink anything!!

Navigator on November 11, 2022 First time post-covid! SO READY!